There Was A Man Playing Violin In The Park
by Esther Kirkland
Summary: Sometimes, it's what you hear but refuse to look at that makes all the difference. Post-Reichenbach, soon after the fall. A bit of drabble that's been in my head for a bit. Oneshot. As always, No Slash. Reviews are welcomed!


There was a man playing violin in the park.

The day was cool for the season, cool and pale and damp…a good day for a man who wanted a quiet walk with his head down and his eyes fixed on his shoe tops. Not watching his surroundings, not watching people, not watching anything. Not observing. At one point, that would have been cause for a half-irritated scolding. Now it just…was. And so he walked.

There was a man playing violin as he passed the gazebo. A nice tune for a day like today, mellow and soft with a lot of long notes and tempered rests. It reminded him of a lot of things—coffee with two sugars, presumptuous coats, and baritone chuckles. Not all good things, of course, no sets of memories are ever all good. But when grief is as recent as yesterday's flowers propped against a gravestone and as present as the three-day stubble on your chin, the good ones seem easier to bear. They don't make you feel as if you're betraying the good memories by bringing up the bad ones.

There was a man playing violin at the funeral, he remembers. Nobody he knew—an older gentleman. Someone said something about an old private tutor. He thought the fellow played well, but there had been something lacking, something raw and impatient and untamed that he had just assumed was part of the ordinary sound of violin music. Until he listened to someone else play—really listened—for the first time. And then he realized that, just like everything else, that had been special too. Non-ordinary. Amazing, fantastic, brilliant. Gone.

There was a man playing violin—still playing—the second time he walked around the little trail that meandered through the park. He wondered if the man played all day, and if he did it for the bills and coins in the case at his feet or if he did it for the sheer pleasure of sharing his music. The sound was soothing, and he stopped and took a seat on a bench to listen. Listen to the long, slow tones sliding down the air like honey down a sore throat. A balm for the soul, an ointment for a heart that was raw with unshed tears. It hurt to keep things bottled up like that—like acid that ate away at your spirit until there was nothing left holding it back. But it was better to hold it back, to keep it behind the dam of heartbreak rather than allow others to see your weakness. He would never be weak. Even this hurt, this bewildered, uncomprehending grief, would never break him. He would bleed the reservoir of its contents slowly, spreading it around so that no one would notice. And then, drained, he would return stronger than ever.

There was a man playing violin in the park. That was one of life's small joys that he would soon be able to appreciate again. Someday soon, he would come to the park, and someone would be playing the violin. And the sound would lift his spirits and his eyes, and he would be able to hold his head up again, and smile at strangers on the street, and not look in every face he met for pity or condemnation or scorn or—worst of all—hope. But for now, he kept his head low. He didn't look up from his shoe tops. Just watched the concrete under his resting feet, following the epic journey of an ant as it traversed the wasteland of the sidewalk. Across the small stretch of green, the man continued playing, an old ballad now—something about the soldier's return.

There was a man playing violin almost every time he came to the park. If it wasn't a man with a violin, it was a girl with a guitar or an old woman with a Chinese flute or a guy with a saxophone. He liked the saxophone player—something about those smoothly-rasping tones, full of blue-eyed soul and the knowledge of life on both sides of the tracks. It was…good. But the violin was still better. The violin was connected to memories. The violin was connected to his grief and healing both.

The man playing the violin stopped. He usually played on and on for hours. Perhaps he had seen the down-gazing figure on the bench. Rising, the figure turned to leave the park. His lunch break was nearly over. He needed to get back so that his coworkers could take their break. But he was glad that he had heard the violin player today. He couldn't quite bring himself to look up, couldn't quite bring himself to imagine, but a tiny back corner of his mind saw with more clarity than he wanted to admit, more wishful thinking than he would ever acknowledge: the short-cropped dark hair, the hat that shaded the ice-like eyes, the pale skin and sharply-chiseled face. He wouldn't look back, wouldn't see the regretful, watching gaze that followed his retreating back across the park and out the front gate, wouldn't see the tiny shake of the head as the musician lifted the instrument back to a ready position and raised the bow in readiness. He wouldn't hear the familiar tunes that followed, now that he was out of earshot. The violinist knew that one day, he would look up. One day, he would be ready to see again, ready to observe life again, ready to _know_. Until then…

There was a man playing violin in the park.


End file.
